Tuesday, September 30, 2014

Twelve Mad Men / Bracha, Nixon, et al

Click
on a YES above to go to appropriate page in Amazon, Barnes & Noble, or
Smashwords store

Author:

Twelve
different authors contributed to this novel, including Pals past and present,
Ryan Bracha and Keith Nixon, along with ten others. Most of the others have had
their solo work reviewed here with three of these (Les Edgerton, Richard
Godwin, and Gerard Brennan) receiving nominations in the 2014 BigAl’s Books and
Pals Readers’ Choice Awards. In addition to those already mentioned, contributions were
also made by Paul D Brazill, Craig Furchtenicht, Allen Miles, Darren Sant, Gareth
Spark, Martin Stanley, and Mark Wilson.

Description:

“At St.
David's asylum for the criminally insane there are twelve residents. They call
us that. Not inmates.

We all have
a favourite colour. A favourite member of staff. A favourite method of
receiving torture for the purposes of science.

We all have
our reasons for being here. Our stories. Our tales.

Why don't
you come and hear them?

Twelve Mad
Men is a groundbreaking literary collaboration. A novel which has a series of
stories woven into the narrative, and featuring the finest independent authors
from across the globe.”

Appraisal:

Run off to
Amazon (unless you’re there already), click the look inside for this book, and
read Ryan Bracha’s introduction. If the concept appeals to you, the book
should, too. For the tl;dr crowd (that’s “too long; didn’t read, for the
uninitiated), the concept is each of the contributors imagined they were
“residents” at St. David's Asylum for the Criminally Insane, and tell the story
of how they got there. As Bracha says in the introduction, it is a chance for
each to “showcase their most depraved sides.” Then Bracha added words of his
own between each contribution to weave a coherent whole.

It turned
out better than I’d have guessed possible. Assuming depraved and (again
borrowing from Bracha’s intro) “violent, sweary, funny, and filthy” are your
thing. (Aren’t they everyone’s?) That each author’s character used their own
name added to the humor as I, for example, imagined Keith Nixon as an oil
painting crazy with a talent for making psychiatrists throw up their hands in
frustration or Mark Wilson as a gender-confused patient with an addiction to
what in times past was euphemistically called “self-abuse” (often accompanied
by warnings of impending blindness). Not for the faint of heart, but a must
read for horror fans interested in something different.

FYI:

Among the
things we normally mention here are if a particular flavor (or flavour) of
English is used (the authors are from both the US and UK and this is reflected
in word usage, slang, and possibly spelling conventions), whether there is
sexual content (yup), adult language (yes, yes, OH YES), or anything else that
might rile up, offend, or nauseate some people (you betcha). Sensitive types, this
book’s not for you.

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